Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Shale Wealth Spreads Halfway Around the World to Poor Indian Farmers Growing Beans for Fracking

Yesterday, I wrote a post about the new "sand millionaires" and "sand prosperity" in Wisconsin and Minnesota because of the "frac sand boom" going on there.

In June, I featured a WSJ article about how the U.S. shale revolution is spreading prosperity to poor farmers on the other side of the planet in India who are growing guar beans (pictured above), which are now used extensively to extract shale oil and gas in the U.S. using advanced hydraulic fracturing technology.

The New York Times has a related front page article today about how "India's dirt-poor farmers are striking gas-drilling gold" with the guar bean, here's an excerpt:

"Guar, a modest bean so hard that it can crack teeth, has become an
unlikely global player, and dirt-poor farmers in India have
suddenly become a crucial link in the energy production of the United
States.

For centuries, farmers here used guar to feed their families and their
cattle. There are better sources of nutrition, but few that grow in the
Rajasthani desert, a land rich in culture but poor in rain. Broader
commercial interest in guar first developed when food companies found
that it absorbs water like a souped-up cornstarch, and a powdered form
of the bean is now widely used to thicken ice cream and keep pastries
crisp.

But much more important to farmers here was the recent discovery that
guar could stiffen water so much that a mixture is able to carry sand
sideways into wells drilled by horizontal fracturing, also known as
fracking.

Guar farmers, traders and processors admitted fulfilling some
long-held dreams with the profits they made last year. Some took trips
to Europe; some bought gold; others got married (see related NY Times story "My Big Fat Guar Wedding")."

3 Comments:

Queue some leftist rant about how, "Now the poor's main food source is being taking away! Only to poison the water of the poor in America!"

Or something equally as silly.

BTW: PA just banned fracking in the Newark Basin. The Newark Basin was drilled in the 80's. Oil and gas was found, but the tech at the time didn't make it economical. The Newark basin extend from Eastern PA through a good portion of NJ. Imagine oil drilling in NJ!